THE COLLAPSE of Barack Obama’s presidency may not be as sudden as the September disintegration of the Red Sox, but it’s been as unpleasant to watch. Hope has given way to recrimination. The soaring expectations of January 2009 have been replaced with futile admonishments for Congress to “pass this bill.’’ The winner of the Nobel Peace Prize has lost the enthusiasm of the young and left-out who once funded his campaign.
On the last day of March 1968, President Lyndon Johnson appeared on national television with a surprise announcement: “I shall not seek and I will not accept the nomination of my party as your president.’’ Could the same happen this year? It is a speculation making the political rounds. Dick Morris, Clinton triangulator now turned Tea Party maven, pushes the idea, and it’s a notion that has been picked up elsewhere, mostly in the conservative media.
Obama, runs the argument, is too far down in the polls to ever recover. He’s flailing in the job, out of his depth and beset from right and left. And they say, he’s unhappy. He smiles little, he’s abrupt and uncomfortable. Even spouse Michelle no longer seems to enjoy the limelight. “These folks aren’t having fun anymore,’’ observes Morris.
And if not Barack Obama, then who? Hillary Clinton, naturally. After some initial stumbles, Clinton has acquitted herself well as secretary of state. Many Democrats are feeling buyer’s remorse, wondering if perhaps they should have chosen her four years ago. She would have been a tougher negotiator with Congress. She wouldn’t have blithely ceded cherished Democratic programs for little or no return. And whispering in her ear, of course, would have been Bill, whose eight-year term in retrospect looks ever the brighter.
Perhaps one can gauge a president’s desire for a second term by his smiles, but much of this seems dubious, a mixture of wishful thinking and pop psychology. LBJ didn’t pull out because the job lacked amusement. For one, the prospects for Johnson’s re-nomination looked tough; he faced internal challenges from both Gene McCarthy and Robert Kennedy.
More importantly, Johnson believed that the great issue of the day - Vietnam - required him to make decisions unfettered by political considerations. War-making is an area where presidents, as commanders in chief, have nearly unilateral authority. Indeed, in the same speech in which he took a pass on a second term, LBJ unveiled a plan to halt US raids in North Vietnam in a bid to kick off peace talks.
But Obama’s problems are domestic, not international. Even if he were to pull out for some grand purpose, it’s hard to imagine what that would be. It’s not as if Republicans would suddenly rally around a jobs bill merely because Obama exited the race. Far from it. As a lame duck perceived as a quitter, his influence would simply evaporate.
Nor does Obama face any meaningful challenges from within the Democratic Party. So the case for Obama to leave is that he does it for the good of the party, essentially conceding it is impossible for him to win. It’s here where the analogy to the Red Sox breaks down. The Sox lost at the end of their season; Obama’s campaign has yet to begin.
Granted, some polls show that a generic Republican could beat Obama. But the problem for Republicans is that they have to move from the generic to the specific, and right now the president’s campaign team has to be chortling. The Republicans are at each other’s throats, desperately casting about for a candidate. Mitt Romney is detested by many in the party, Michele Bachmann has faded, Rick Perry is stumbling badly and Chris Christie keeps saying no (and appears to mean it). One on one, Obama is a formidable campaigner, and each of the GOP’s candidates has serious flaws. All the support Obama may have lost from his base over the last year or so will likely return to the fold when the stark choice comes down to him versus the Republican nominee.
Who knows what’s in the president’s head. Maybe he really is so discouraged that he follows LBJ’s example. But emotion aside, logic suggests he press on.
Originally published in the Boston Globe.